The reply of Thatcher was read in the House, causing much merriment and leaving his adversary—
"Sacred to ridicule his whole life long,
And the sad burden of some merry song."
It is hardly necessary to add that at last accounts the consent of
Mrs. Thatcher had not been obtained.
It is scarcely remembered that Lord Byron, angered by a bitter criticism, once challenged the poet Southey. Accepting the challenge conditionally, Southey added:
"In affairs of this kind, the participants ought to meet on equal terms. But to establish the equality between you and me there are two things that ought to be done, and a third may also be necessary before I meet you on the field. First, you must marry and have four children—all girls. Second, you must prove that the greater part of the provision which you make for them depends upon you life, and you must be under bond for four thousand pounds not to be hanged, commit suicide, nor be killed in a duel, which are the conditions upon which I have insured my life for the benefit of my wife and daughters. Third, you must convert me to infidelity. We can then meet on equal terms, and your challenge will be cheerfully accepted."
Since the writing of the letters of Junius, nothing probably has appeared equal in invective to the correspondence seventy years ago between Daniel O'Connell and Benjamin Disraeli. The former was at the time a distinguished member of Parliament, and an orator without a peer. Disraeli, at first a supporter of the policy of the great Liberator, had joined the ranks of his enemies, and was unsparing in his denunciation of O'Connell and his party. In his reply O'Connell, after charging his assailant with ingratitude and treachery, concluded as follows:
"I cannot divest my mind of the belief that if your genealogy were traced, it would be found that you are the lineal descendant and true heir-at-law of the impenitent thief who atoned for his crimes upon the cross."
The challenge from Disraeli, which immediately followed, was treated by O'Connell with supreme contempt.
The duel between Hamilton and Burr is of perennial interest to the American people. Both were men of great distinction and splendid talents. Both had been soldiers during the Revolutionary War, and Hamilton was the confidential friend and for a time chief-of-staff of Washington. Burr had been a Senator from New York, and was at the time of the duel Vice-President of the United States. He was one of the recognized leaders of the dominant party, and by many considered the probable successor of Jefferson in the great office. Whatever hopes he might have had for the Presidency were destroyed by his alleged attempt to defeat Jefferson and secure his own elevation by the House of Representatives in 1801. His hostility to Hamilton had its beginning in the opposition of the latter to Burr's aspirations to the Presidency. Differing widely, as Hamilton did, with Jefferson upon important questions then pending, he nevertheless preferred the latter to Burr, and his influence eventually turned the scales—after a protracted struggle —in favor of Jefferson.
The valuable service just mentioned was one of the many rendered by Hamilton. He was the earnest advocate of the adoption of the Federal Constitution, and his papers during that pivotal struggle have justly given him high place in the list of American statesmen. He was the first Secretary of the Treasury, and possibly no man possessed in larger degree the confidence of Washington.